{"id":14787,"date":"2012-08-23T17:39:42","date_gmt":"2012-08-23T17:39:42","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2012-08-23T17:39:42","modified_gmt":"2012-08-23T17:39:42","slug":"republicans_shouldn_t_give_the_left_the_power_to_impact_their_own_self_esteem","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rushlimbaugh.com\/daily\/2012\/08\/23\/republicans_shouldn_t_give_the_left_the_power_to_impact_their_own_self_esteem\/","title":{"rendered":"Republicans Shouldn\u2019t Give the Left the Power to Impact Their Own Self-Esteem"},"content":{"rendered":"

RUSH: Vinny in Brooklyn. Great to have you on the EIB Network. Hello, sir.<\/p>\n

CALLER: The great one, so good to listen to you again.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Thank you, Vinny.<\/p>\n

CALLER: You know, I\u2019m a bit despondent over what\u2019s going on. But I can\u2019t help but think, just like tigers eat their own, eat their young, we of the GOP are exactly the same. And we\u2019ve given the Democrats, in my opinion, license to run with these kind of Akin <\/a>stories over and over and over again because, I mean, we\u2019ve beat down the door to throw our own under the bus. I know you said this a few days ago, and I tried to get through then to, you know, applaud your sentiment, but I am so despondent over what this man in Missouri — you know, the stance he\u2019s taken now and how the Democrats are just gonna run with this all the way to November 6th over and over. You know Sandra Fluke, I believe, is speaking at the DNC now, at their convention, if I\u2019m not mistaken.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

RUSH: No, no, no, no, that can\u2019t be. She is just a college student. They only have Democrat operatives speak at the convention. <\/p>\n

CALLER: (laughing) Well, you know, Rush, and I\u2019ll say one more thing. I was talking with Bo about this. I really believe our biggest enemy is not Barack Obama. Our biggest enemy is the mainstream media. And Romney <\/a>and the GOP must learn to speak above and beyond the media like Ronald Reagan did so successfully. Otherwise, Barack Obama could never get away with what he\u2019s getting away with, and they could never get away with the things that they get away with on a daily basis. We must learn to overcome the media bias because that is what will undo us in the end, not Barack Obama. And I really feel strongly about that.<\/p>\n

RUSH: A lot of people do. A lot of people agree with you, and nobody has the answer for it. The only answer anybody has is what you said, Reagan. And how often do you get people like that?<\/p>\n

CALLER: Well, we have you, and Lord knows you do it every day, but I guess what I\u2019m saying is we need our candidate to come out. Again, this is a big point of contention with some people. I really think Romney <\/a>should come out and literally condemn certain people by name. I mean, I\u2019ve never seen that, basically —<\/p>\n

RUSH: I got ten seconds. Condemn who?<\/p>\n

CALLER: Well, when you have CNN <\/a>that\u2019s just running the Todd Akin story day after day after day —<\/p>\n

RUSH: Okay, hang on, hang on, hang on. Don\u2019t go away.<\/p>\n

BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n

RUSH: Okay, we\u2019re back with Vinny in Brooklyn now. Vinny, you\u2019re either all over the board because of your despondency or I am depressed and miserable and therefore unable to understand what you\u2019re talking about. You started out by saying that you\u2019re ticked off that we eat our own. Then you sound like you want Akin to be thrown to the wolves. Now you want Romney to condemn people by name. Who? This is after you were properly pointing out how the media is an obstacle. By the way, that\u2019s not gonna change. The media isn\u2019t gonna change, and there has only been one Reagan in my lifetime who has the skill to go above and beyond them. So who do you want Romney to condemn?<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

CALLER: You know, excuse me for sounding so frustrated, but that\u2019s what I am. I\u2019m just frustrated. I mean, I just notice how the Democrats, you know, en masse move to condemn whoever they\u2019re out to condemn as an entire party. Meanwhile, you know, maybe we ought to do that. Maybe when someone like Chuck Todd misreports about something and paints a conservative into a monster that he\u2019s not, you know, maybe it\u2019s time for, not just Romney, but the leadership to speak up and say, “Wait a minute, we\u2019re just not gonna grant interviews to someone like Chuck Todd if he\u2019s not gonna report things honestly,” and I guess that\u2019s what I\u2019m trying to say. <\/p>\n

RUSH: Okay. So you want Romney to condemn Chuck Todd. You want Romney and Ryan to say, “To hell with your debates. We\u2019re not showing up with a stacked deck.” <\/p>\n

CALLER: No, no. No. No, no. I\u2019m just using Chuck Todd as an example. I\u2019m just trying to say we don\u2019t effectually fight back. You know, I agree with everything you said the other day. I felt just like you did. I didn\u2019t necessarily feel it was my place to throw Akin to the wolves, but, at the same time he should have done the right thing and stepped down to the bigger picture. Are we together on this?<\/p>\n

RUSH: Yep. So far.<\/p>\n

CALLER: Okay. All I was trying to comment on is what you echoed. Okay, nothing\u2019s different, all right? We are so quick to throw our own to the wolves, and the Democrats see that, and, you know, they pounce on it because they know —<\/p>\n

RUSH: Okay, let\u2019s examine. Hold it a minute. Let\u2019s take that one and let\u2019s talk about it. I want to ask your opinion, your theory. Let\u2019s use the Akin example. Akin comes out and says, “You know what? In the case of ‘legitimate rape,\u2019 yeah, but ‘illegitimate rape,\u2019 a woman\u2019s body shuts down and pregnancy infrequently occurs,” and everybody has a cow, and everybody on the Republican side gets in a race to the cameras and a race to the microphones to denounce the guy, throw him overboard, “Get the hell out of the party. Who do you think you are, you dumb idiot.” Why do you think they do that, Vinny? What is it that drives them to do it?<\/p>\n

CALLER: I think they\u2019re afraid of the media.<\/p>\n

RUSH: All right. You\u2019re exactly right. It\u2019s a combination of a desire to be politically correct and afraid of the media. I think in this case there was also an element of genuine truth in it. “Oh, no, this guy\u2019s gotta go.” There was no question, but at the same time what bothers me… see, you were gonna talk about how you\u2019re despondent. Can I tell you what bothers me more than anything in the world?<\/p>\n

CALLER: Sure. I know I\u2019m gonna get it here, but go ahead. (laughing)<\/p>\n

RUSH: No. No. It\u2019s not about you. What bothers me, I have to be so careful saying this, too. But when you make every decision in your life or when you allow your happiness, your self-worth to be determined by what you think other people think of you, you\u2019re finished, you are dead. You don\u2019t have the guts to be who you are. You are granting people all kinds of power, and I think that that\u2019s one of the reasons why there was a mad dash for these massive calls for Akin to go on our side because, in Washington, \u2019cause I think the liberals so dominate that place that the conservatives who live there want their respect. They want to get along. They don\u2019t want to be thought of as extreme, wacko conservatives. So this guy pipes up and sends chills down their spine, “Oh, my God, this guy just confirmed what they think we\u2019re all like.” So they run to the microphones and their primary objective was to tell everybody, particularly the liberal media, “Hey, I don\u2019t agree with this guy. Don\u2019t confuse me with this guy.”<\/line><\/p>\n

There was also, as I say, there was also an element of genuine “this guy\u2019s gotta go,” I think there are a lot of factors here that deserve some weight in terms of explaining what people do. But over all, don\u2019t use the Akin thing. It still happens. We still have people in our media, in our party, who are obsessed that the liberals not think of them as they think of all conservatives. It grates on me. It bothers me. I know it\u2019s hard, \u2019cause everybody wants to be loved and everybody wants to be respected and everybody wants to be highly thought of. So any time a massive bunch of criticism hits, most people wilt \u2019cause they don\u2019t know how to deal with it, don\u2019t want to deal with it. They don\u2019t care to understand why it\u2019s happening, and don\u2019t want it to happen anymore. <\/p>\n

CALLER: Can I say one more thing to you?<\/p>\n

RUSH: Yeah.<\/p>\n

CALLER: Okay. Just one more thing to you. We need to think of an effective way to answer our critics, because no matter what we do, who we throw to the wolves, we\u2019re not gonna be liked. We\u2019re never gonna be liked. Okay, and we just sit there and we keep saying, “But, look, but, look.” We\u2019re doomed.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Vinny, I\u2019m gonna stop you. You stepped in it again. You stepped in it again, as far as I\u2019m concerned. When you said we have to find an effective way to answer our critics. Let me ask you, what —<\/p>\n

CALLER: Fight, I mean fight. Fight. When I say answer, I mean fight. Fight back.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Okay, what is your objective in answering the critics? Now really think about this. Take it as far out as you can think. Go beyond the knee-jerk and visceral here. What do you want to happen as a result of fighting back or answering the critics?<\/p>\n

CALLER: I just want people to be judged evenly. This double standard is so prevalent and it\u2019s so obvious. I mean, it\u2019s so frustrating day in and day out. I mean you brought up all those great examples. What\u2019s-his-name from Florida in 2006, thrown to the wolves right away. The member from the House, from Florida. I\u2019m having a mental block on his name.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Mark Foley.<\/p>\n

CALLER: Yeah.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Now, when you bring that up, are you saying that you would have preferred the Republicans circle the wagons around the guy and not let —<\/p>\n

CALLER: Yes.<\/p>\n

RUSH: — the Democrats get away with —<\/p>\n

CALLER: Yes.<\/p>\n

RUSH: — smearing him and the party?<\/p>\n

CALLER: In that instance, yeah, because it didn\u2019t do us any good anyway. And we threw another one of our own under the bus. Where does it get us? It gets us nowhere. It doesn\u2019t get us liked in Washington, and you know as well as I do we\u2019re never going to be liked or accepted in the Beltway because it is a liberal town, and that\u2019s that. We\u2019re hated there, and we\u2019re really not of it. And for those of us on our side, part of the establishment, well, we\u2019re trying to get rid of them, too. They\u2019re the first ones that did run for the microphones.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Let me answer this personally. I\u2019m gonna answer the question I asked you. I\u2019ll use my own personal examples in trying to explain this. When this program started in 1988, everybody who knew me thought that I was okay. Nobody hated me (that I knew of) and the people who knew me certainly did not think that I “hated” people. The ways that I was being described starting in 1988 simply because I was a conservative — racist, sexist, bigot, homophobe — all of those things, nobody who knew me knew any of that to be true. It wasn\u2019t true. But yet here it came. <\/p>\n

Now, I can sit here and tell you some things after 24 years of this. I started radio in 1967. I was 16. I\u2019ve always wanted to be a guy on the radio. Now look. With 30% of the people in this country, my reputation is mud, it\u2019s dirt forever, simply because of what you just said: the media. Simply because of lies, distortions, untruths that have been said about me. My reputation\u2019s destroyed, and not through anything that I did. It\u2019s just the reality. So in the ensuing four years, in \u201988, when this character assassination started, I was totally unprepared for it. <\/p>\n

Nothing like it had happened in my success track in Sacramento, so I didn\u2019t know how to deal with it. And there was nobody I was with that knew how to deal with it. Nobody to give me advice. I had every bit of advice you can imagine, which I\u2019ve mentioned before. Some said, “You can\u2019t let that go. You gotta respond to that. You gotta fight back. You gotta react to your critics.” Others said, “Don\u2019t dare do it. If you react they\u2019re just gonna think they upset you, which is what they want to do and they\u2019re gonna keep going.” Then a guy said, “You gotta understand, they\u2019re only doing this because you\u2019re a threat, you\u2019re effective.” So then I had to learn — and this is tough; I defy anybody to go out and do this. I had to learn to take being hated as a sign of success. <\/p>\n

Now, who grows up wanting that? Who in the world is raised to be hated (other than maybe, you know, these despots that have lived). I don\u2019t think anybody is raised or wants to grow up to be hated, and certainly not to have that be defined as part of your success.<\/p>\n

But let me tell you when my real awakening occurred, and this cuts to the nub of it. This is the question I was asking you. Take this out. When I said, “What do you hope to achieve with whatever you want Romney to do (or Ryan to do or anybody else to do) whenever this criticism comes? This unfair, lying, sack-of-you-know-what criticism — all of this stuff that\u2019s told about us that\u2019s not true — what do you want to happen?” The truthful answer is that you want it to stop.<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

The truthful answer is you want the media to stop! You want somebody to come along and make \u2019em stop it. You want a teacher, you want a principal, you want a referee. You want somebody to come along and make it stop. And then the awakening occurs when you realize you can\u2019t stop it. There is not a thing you can do to stop it. There\u2019s not a thing you can do to change it. Other than join them. Other than totally cave. Other than totally sell out. That\u2019s the only way you can stop it, is to join them.<\/p>\n

Now, if you don\u2019t choose that option, then you\u2019re stuck with it. There\u2019s nothing you can do. It\u2019s the way it is. It\u2019s the lay of the land. You can\u2019t change it. You can\u2019t stop it. The media isn\u2019t going to change. There\u2019s not a one of us alive — there\u2019s not a single person alive — that can make them stop it and be fair. There\u2019s not a single person alive who can make them change. So then what becomes the objective? The only thing left to do is beat them, which we can do, by being who we are; and by being unafraid to be who we are.<\/p>\n

But if we\u2019re gonna constantly be, at the end of everything, afraid of who we are? Or if we\u2019re gonna end up being afraid of what they say we are? If we\u2019re gonna be afraid and defensive as to how they talk about us and what they accuse us of being? Then they\u2019re forever going to win, because our objective is forever going to be flawed. It is going to be to try to change them. Here\u2019s one of the best pieces of advice I ever got.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been doing interviews starting in 1988. And I honestly thought that, when I was being asked on the Today Show or wherever, that a journalist was seriously interested in what I thought. And I thought, “Okay, I got a chance to really square them away. I got a chance to show them where they\u2019re wrong.” That\u2019s not what they\u2019re interested in! You can\u2019t correct them. I could spend ten years with Chuck Todd and not change his worldview.<\/p>\n

It isn\u2019t going to happen. So you learn that you do these interviews for an expressly different purpose. You get your message out no matter what they say. The fact of the matter is there are just certain realities that you have to accept, and being despondent over “unfairness” is something we\u2019re gonna have to get over here. It\u2019s been 25 years, and I still hear people upset about it. I\u2019ll continue with this.<\/p>\n

BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n

RUSH: Now, all of that having been said, back to Akin for just a second. Akin, that situation\u2019s a huge problem. Now, you can be upset at members of the Republican Party or the conservative movement who joined in unison to denounce Akin and to suggest (or ask or demand, whatever they did) that he get out of the race. But by the same token, we have no obligation to support people who don\u2019t deserve it!<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

And you don\u2019t deserve support just \u2019cause you say you\u2019re conservative. You don\u2019t deserve support just because you got an (R) beside your name. And you people know that. We support people who are also fighting the good fight. You talk about, “What do you want to happen?” You sit around and you cite the unfairness or the lack of balance or what have you in the media. (That seems to be a lot of people\u2019s focal point.) What we really want to happen — and, of course, by the way, it differs from person to person.<\/p>\n

Some people are totally obsessed with being liked, and so they will say — and I\u2019m talking about on our side, in the media, wherever. They want to be liked, and so they\u2019ll say whatever they think they have to say to be liked. They\u2019ll criticize whoever they think they have to be critical of in order to be liked. Others of us want to win! Others of us want to try to persuade as many people as possible: “It doesn\u2019t matter whether you like me or not, but if you love this country the way we do, you have got to see it our way.”<\/p>\n

And that\u2019s our objective.<\/p>\n

Our objective is to sway and mobilize public opinion in our favor.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re in the arena of ideas. We\u2019re competing with an unfair, stacked deck. It\u2019s the way it is, and we can\u2019t change it. Not individually. All we can do is defeat it. And it can be done. We do it quite frequently, actually. Now, I learned long ago to give up on this notion of being loved. I\u2019ve become accustomed to being hated. I had to! It\u2019s a sign of success. I\u2019ve had to define it that way. But with Akin, we do not have to support people who are not fighting the good fight like we are and who put themselves above it.<\/p>\n

You can\u2019t generalize.<\/p>\n

This is a specific case.<\/p>\n

What we\u2019re after is persuading as many people as possible in the arena of ideas to agree with us so that we advance our objectives — which are honorable, forthright, and worth it. <\/p>\n

BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n

RUSH: Julie, Osage Beach, Missouri, hi, and great to have you here.<\/p>\n

CALLER: Thank you. I\u2019ve been waiting an hour-and-a-half.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Well, I appreciate it. I appreciate you waited so long.<\/p>\n

CALLER: Well, let me tell you why, because in 1988, which you brought up earlier, I was an 11-year-old girl. My mother pulled me out of school, and I started listening to your program, called the Rush Limbaugh Show. And I gained those ideals. Thank you very much. And I get it.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Well, I appreciate that. Thank you so much for yourself. I appreciate that.<\/p>\n

CALLER: I\u2019ve also seen your brother at a Worldview Weekend conference, so I\u2019ve also met David. But, anyways, the reason I\u2019m calling, I really think the Republicans bombed it here with Todd Akin. You know, they blew an entire opportunity here to slam Claire McCaskill <\/a>and bring up her dirt. She\u2019s got so much dirt and so much baggage. I don\u2019t know why they keep talking about him. It\u2019s ridiculous. All we needed to do was change the talking points. Simple, simple solution, change the talking points. What did he say? That maybe a woman\u2019s body shuts down under stress. Big deal. A man can\u2019t say that in our country now? We don\u2019t have freedom of speech of that? I mean, we throw him under the bus? <\/line><\/p>\n

Look at all the amazing things that he\u2019s done in our government, amazing things. Not only that, but he did the dirty work that a lot of Republicans weren\u2019t gonna do, like clean up a bunch of women who were gonna claim rape. It\u2019s too bad that we just didn\u2019t change the talking points. It\u2019s real simple. I just said it. So he speculates that maybe a woman\u2019s body shuts down. That doesn\u2019t even have anything to do with whether or not she\u2019s conceived or not. He hates abortion. The Democrats are already offended by that. Women who are pro-choice are already offended by that. And we know he\u2019s very pro-life. So I don\u2019t quite get why they didn\u2019t just quickly use the media for good. You talked about winning the game. We coulda won the game. They blew it up. They blew it up. Big time. I agreed with Vinny on that. There was no reason for that. They\u2019re already offended.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Well, but you understand, there\u2019s this naturally defensive posture that conservatives, and particularly in Washington, conservatives and Republicans have. They don\u2019t control the media. There\u2019s no way they can get their talking points on the media. No matter what they did, the media was not gonna start talking about Claire McCaskill, no matter what they said. So the calculation then became —<\/p>\n

CALLER: Ann Coulter could have talked about Claire McCaskill. Sarah Palin could have talked about Claire McCaskill. Plenty of those people. Sean Hannity could have talked about Claire McCaskill. I mean it\u2019s ridiculous. Yeah, what about the airplane? Let\u2019s talk about the airplane. She\u2019s hiding hundreds of thousands of dollars, you know, that she owes the government. I mean there\u2019s so much stuff there. I\u2019m just saying, you know, he\u2019s just a pro-lifer. Big deal. He\u2019s just very pro-life. But they turn this into something it wasn\u2019t, gave the feminists more reasons to hate men, you know, when all they needed to say was it\u2019s okay for men to actually talk about a woman\u2019s egg and not make a big deal about it. They can do that, you know, and we just feed right into the whole political correctness, you know, that you even speculate or take an angle —<\/p>\n

RUSH: Well, there\u2019s a piece today, let me see if I can find this. I\u2019m not sure I printed this out, but you would appreciate this. It\u2019s by George Neumayr, who used to be the editor at the American Spectator, and he might have written this piece there. It sounds like word-for-word what you just said. Neumayr is saying this incident illustrates the fatal problem that the Republican Party has, and that is a desire to please its critics, please its enemies, knee-jerk defensiveness and all. No, I didn\u2019t print it out. I don\u2019t have it here. I thought I did. <\/p>\n

CALLER: There\u2019s this, “Oh, we need to be afraid of the left \u2019cause somehow they\u2019re right.” No, they\u2019re not. We\u2019re right. Why are we cowing?<\/p>\n

RUSH: No.<\/p>\n

CALLER: Why are we cowing?<\/p>\n

RUSH: No, wait a minute. It\u2019s not that they\u2019re right. It\u2019s that there\u2019s a battle for the hearts and minds of voters, for the American people. The great fear here was that — see, the Democrats have these caricatures of us. Julie, you\u2019re well aware of \u2019em: racist, sexist, bigot, homophobe, anti-women, so Akin came along and he said something — it\u2019s indefensible what he said in terms of fact. It\u2019s simply indefensible. And so the fear was, “Oh, my God, this guy is helping the media confirm a bunch of lies about us.” And that\u2019s what they —<\/p>\n

CALLER: We don\u2019t need to be afraid. We don\u2019t need to be afraid of the left and we\u2019re acting afraid by saying that. We just simply change the talking point, explain it differently. That\u2019s what they do. They sit around and make explanations for Joe Biden and President Obama —<\/p>\n

RUSH: I agree we shouldn\u2019t let them have that power over us and some of us don\u2019t let them have that power, but —<\/p>\n

CALLER: Yes.<\/p>\n

RUSH: — it\u2019s very few that act that way. You know, being on defense becomes a habit, and in some cases it just doesn\u2019t change. But I hear you. Some of the piling on of Todd Akin was a little gratuitous. He\u2019s not a pig. He\u2019s not any of this kind of stuff. I cringe sometimes at some of the criticism, but at the same time he\u2019s now gone and made himself bigger than the cause and bigger than the purpose here, and he\u2019s making it very difficult to support him. We can\u2019t change the talking points. I wish we could. Some people decided, even if it was reflexively, that this was not the place to plant the flag, that there will be other places. Anyway, Julie, your mom pulled you out of school at age 11 to listen to this program, and listen to how she turned out. You hear that passion? You mothers out there should do more of that. Pull your kids out of school at age 11, let \u2019em listen to this program and they\u2019ll be that much ahead.<\/p>\n

BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n

RUSH: I found the George Neumayr piece. It is in the American Spectator. Let me just give you some pull-quotes from this thing: “A party less cowed by political correctness and less in thrall to conventional wisdom wouldn\u2019t have cannibalized its own so quickly. … [L]et\u2019s not forget that Barack Obama hired as one of his top Department of Education officials a gay-rights activist named Kevin Jennings, who once glibly counseled a \u201915-year-old\u2019 student thought to have been statutorily raped by an older man: ‘I hope you knew to use a condom.\u2019<\/p>\n

“Jennings is also known for having been ‘inspired\u2019 by Harry Hay, a supporter of the North American Man\/Boy Love Association.” NAMBLA! Nobody complains about this, and the Democrats aren\u2019t even embarrassed. “In a culture that panders to pro-abortion feminists like Sandra Fluke, thought crimes always rank higher than real ones. Words, not deeds, drive pols from public life. So Akin has to go. He simply harbors the wrong thoughts …” Neumayr is not happy with what happened.<\/p>\n

“An authentically conservative party would find Romney\u2019s unprincipled position far more chilling than Akin\u2019s gaffe. If unborn children gain or lose their right to life depending upon the circumstances of their conception, then the party has already conceded that that right doesn\u2019t exist. Ronald Reagan understood the implications of that concession and never wavered in his defense of the right to life of all unborn children, not just some of them.” Folks, I\u2019m here to tell you: I know exactly what Akin was trying to say.<\/p>\n

I know exactly.<\/p>\n

He believes that the baby is the essence of innocence and there is no exception. It\u2019s never the baby\u2019s fault. And all he believes is that if you\u2019re going to allow abortion in the case of rape, then you\u2019re really not pro-life. That\u2019s all he was trying to say. He just didn\u2019t know how to say it. So in order to be pervasive, he came up with this biological lesson\u2019s not true. And he got a fact wrong. Neumayr here is saying: “His stupid remark was thereby turned into a supposedly wicked one and treated as a great crisis for the party.<\/p>\n

“A party less cowed by political correctness and less in thrall to conventional wisdom wouldn\u2019t have cannibalized its own so quickly.” So Neumayr believes that the Republicans just panicked because they are prisoners to convention wisdom, political correctness, and wanting to be liked, or not criticized.<\/p>\n

Look, there\u2019s a guy… This guy… What\u2019s his name? The Twisted Sister guy. Dee Snider, Twisted Sister. Apparently Paul Ryan at his events is using a song by this guy. And so this guy\u2019s out there saying (paraphrased), “I\u2019m not letting Ryan use my song! Who the hell do they think they are?” So Dee Snider has told Ryan, “You can\u2019t use my song,” and the media loves this. Why? Because here\u2019s a pop culture guy, Twisted Sister, and it\u2019s a perfect vehicle for showing that Republicans aren\u2019t cool, that Republicans aren\u2019t hip, that Republicans aren\u2019t likable.<\/line><\/p>\n

That\u2019s why they like it.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s why these musicians come out and do it.<\/p>\n

And that\u2019s the kind of stuff that ticks you off. I know it does, \u2019cause you know exactly what the objective of this is. Ryan\u2019s not a threat to anybody. So he likes this guy\u2019s tune. This guy comes out and says, “You can\u2019t do that,” and the media jumps all over it. Because when you boil it all down, people have a problem with the media. I think you can boil it down to a real simple essence. You\u2019re fed up with media determining who\u2019s “likable” and who isn\u2019t, who\u2019s “cool” and who isn\u2019t, who\u2019s “hip” and who isn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

I totally understand it, but you can\u2019t change it.<\/p>\n

And Ryan using the guy\u2019s song doesn\u2019t make him “hip,” you notice?<\/p>\n

Ryan using the guy\u2019s song doesn\u2019t make him “likable.”<\/p>\n

It doesn\u2019t work, see? You can\u2019t change it.<\/p>\n

So if I were Ryan I\u2019d say, “The hell with it! You can\u2019t tell me when I can\u2019t use your song. I\u2019m using it. Come make me stop! I happen to like your stupid song.” <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

RUSH: Vinny in Brooklyn. Great to have you on the EIB Network. Hello, sir. CALLER: The great one, so good to listen to you again. RUSH: Thank you, Vinny. CALLER: You know, I\u2019m a bit despondent over what\u2019s going on. But I can\u2019t help but think, just like tigers eat their own, eat their young, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14787","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"yoast_head":"\nRepublicans Shouldn't Give the Left the Power to Impact Their Own Self-Esteem - The Rush Limbaugh Show<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.rushlimbaugh.com\/daily\/2012\/08\/23\/republicans_shouldn_t_give_the_left_the_power_to_impact_their_own_self_esteem\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"Republicans Shouldn't Give the Left the Power to Impact Their Own Self-Esteem - The Rush Limbaugh Show\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"RUSH: Vinny in Brooklyn. 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